Gift Cards for Everyone
Posted on December 30, 2016 by Ching under Family.
Brian and I went to celebrate Christmas Eve at my parents’ home in Derby, as is our tradition. Here are some highlights.
Mom and dad never ask for anything and, since Brian’s parents asked for gift cards this year, we figured we would just get them the exact same thing. Mom suggested Lowe’s for dad but didn’t tell me which gift card to get for her so I got her a Kohl’s gift card, which is the same thing we got for Brian’s mom.
My parents are so weird and overly pragmatic. Of course, the Lowe’s gift card was good because it was “useful.” Mom’s only reaction to her Kohl’s gift card was, “You know I haven’t really been shopping since I’ve been back.”
They’re supposedly “poor” because dad is in between contracts and mom only works whenever she feels like it. LOL.
“Well, now you can get yourself something and not feel guilty about it.” I mean, what else can I say?
These two. Seriously. I think they’d be happier if we didn’t get them anything because that would be more practical. They always say they don’t “need” anything. I would feel terrible not getting them anything, though. You’re supposed to give presents to your parents, right? Is that not the norm?
Unlike my parents, Jenni is always a really good giftee. She tells you specifically want she wants, which is super helpful, and if you do guess and get her something random, she always acts like it’s amazing.
She usually asks for a Passion Planner but she was being really annoying about it and pestering me to get her present early so we gave that to her for her birthday this year. That was both good and bad. Good because then she quit pestering me about her annual Passion Planner and bad in that now we had to figure out what to get her for Christmas.
When Brian and I were at the Spice Merchant a couple of weeks ago looking for black tea (supposedly good for your cholesterol levels) for Brian, we found this ceramic coffee cup with pandas all over it. Brian immediately thought it would be perfect for Jenni. We decided to just get her that along with a QT gift card so she would have some gas money. We weren’t sure what her job situation was like after her “brief sabbatical.”
It turns out that she’s not that hard up. She told us that her unemployment started immediately and she also got some money from mom for Christmas. She’s doing fine. She will probably continue to make bad life choices but at least she’s neither broke nor starving. LOL.
We were all starving so I almost forgot to take pictures of the food. I remembered only after we started eating so these probably aren’t the best photos.
Everything was delicious and, as always, we had way more food than people to eat it. Fine by me because that meant I got to take home leftovers!
I tried to eat some ham but then decided against it and focused my gorging effort on the menudo and sinigang after I remembered that we would have ham again the next day with grandma.
We had several dessert options. I took pictures of the two that I liked. Mom also made biko but I don’t really like biko so I didn’t take a picture of it.
Mom made the leche flan and then this tiramisu was purchased from Costco.
When the Cannadys finally arrived, we let them open their presents from mom and dad first and then gave them our presents. This is QQ opening his gift.
Brian got a great video of the unboxing.
I’m so glad Jen (Cannady) told us exactly what to get for QQ.
As for the older boys, they both wanted money. My challenge was to figure out a way to gift it to them without them realizing they were getting money. In previous years I’d wrapped the money in multiple boxes but that’s obviously been done already. As soon as they see another smaller present within the present and continued to unwrap the next smaller present, the gig would be up.
My idea this year was to put the money inside a book. Of course, as soon as Eli opened his then it wasn’t as much of a surprise for Logan. I think the trick next year will be to gift it in two different ways.
Logan has grown up so much. He is already taller than Brian. It won’t be long before he’s taller than his dad.
It’s always fun to see the Cannadys. They only live a few minutes away but they might as well live in another state. We rarely ever get to see them anymore. Hopefully we can change that in 2017. Logan will be a senior next year and then after that he’ll be off to college (maybe). He’s pretty laid back about everything and not really as passionate or driven as other kids. I hope he finds his passion and that passion leads him to college.
I purposely selected Success for Teens as the book to hold his Christmas money. I hope he actually reads it.
We brought grandma over to our house to celebrate Christmas Day. We opened presents after a light breakfast of coffee (or in my case, hot cocoa, because I’m not a coffee drinker) and cinnamon rolls.
This is grandma opening her first present from us – a large print calendar.
This is Brian opening the present from Aunt Sandy.
She got us these beautiful ornaments. That means I really have to do my boozy tree next year. I’ll have to mix all of the ornaments together into my “natural” tree with critters because we gave our fun, colorfully themed tree to Zach and Autumn this year. It made more sense for them to have it because I didn’t put up Christmas decorations this year and, how many trees does one really need? Truly?
Then it was grandma turn to open a present again.
This next bag had her fruitcake and nuts. She asked for peanuts and cashews.
This next bag had the cookies that grandma wanted. We didn’t deviate from her Christmas list at all except for the bag of Lindor truffles that we tossed in there with the cookies. The funniest part is that Brian’s mom and dad got grandma the exact same bag of Lindor truffles in her crate of Christmas goodies that the sent for her. Great minds think alike!
It looked like the same bag but theirs might have been the smaller bag. We got this one from Costco. That crate they sent her was full of a bunch of other stuff, though. I don’t know what all was in it since I wasn’t present for its unboxing but it was quite heavy. Brian delivered it to grandma after dropping me off at Zumba on Monday night. He didn’t get any pictures of the unboxing her crate of goodies because she wasn’t feeling well.
This next present is from the Orbases in Alaska.
They sent us a super cozy, super warm, super soft throw.
Here’s a video of Brian reading the card that came with the present.
Here’s Brian opening the present from Kevin and Kasey.
They gave us some super festive wine glasses and a couple of bottles of wine to put in them. Except they gave Brian a rose and they gave me a cab so we decided to trade. We think they might have gotten the labels on the gift boxes mixed up. LOL.
Here’s a better picture of the etching on the wine glass.
As is customary whenever we’re not all together during the holidays, we do a video chat with David and Donna in Oklahoma on Christmas Day. Grandma doesn’t see very well anymore but she enjoys it nonetheless. We have to do this every time unless they are here.
For lunch we had an eight-pound ham and mac ‘n cheese.
Way more food than the three of us could eat. We’ve been eating leftovers since.
I used some of the leftover Christmas ham to make fried rice the other day. It actually turned out pretty good.
We also played some Uno in the afternoon. Brian was the big winner this time. Poor grandma, she hasn’t been winning at Uno lately. It might be time to switch to a different card game. LOL.
On Monday we did a down-and-back to visit Brian’s parents in Oklahoma.
They took us to this neat restaurant that is right by the Top Golf in Oklahoma City. I will probably write a separate blog about it.
They got Brian the new Call of Duty game.
They got me not one but two S’well bottles. They are these amazing bottles that keep hot beverages hot for 12 hours and cold beverages cold for 24 hours. I guess it’s kind of like a thermos but cooler. Ha! I made a pun!
They also got us some booze and chocolates along with a bunch of other goodies.
As for our gifts to them, we were lame and got them gift cards. It’s what they asked for, though. We got Cabela’s for David and Kohl’s for Donna. We also know how much they like chocolate so we got a huge tin of chocolate coins for David and chocolate wafer biscuit things for Donna. And then we didn’t want to mail the stuff. Thus, the impromptu trip to Oklahoma.
It worked out well because then we were able to bring their present for grandma back to Wichita so they wouldn’t have to ship it. Mailing that huge crate full of stuff would have been tricky.
We had our final Christmas celebration yesterday. Zach, Autumn, Brian, and I all talked about watching Rogue One together but we had to wait for them to return from Illinois. They’d never watched a movie at Warren 21 before so Brian decided that we would get the movie tickets as their Christmas present.
It’s awesome that we were there to pop their Warren 21 cherry and Rogue One was the perfect movie for it. And the best part – Autumn and I got to wear our Christmas pants to the movies.
Oh, while I was typing up this post today, the mailman delivered a package for us from my half-sister in New Jersey.
She is always so thoughtful and sends the best presents.
Last year she sent us these beautifully monogrammed mugs. They are one of Brian’s favorites but they are my most favorite of all the mugs we have.
Her presents are always amazing so Brian and I were both excited to unbox our gifts. Brian and I both got vests.
They got Brian a cool, reversible one; while mine is a soft fur one. They were absolutely perfect! I was like, “That’s why she asked for our clothes sizes.”
I couldn’t get over how soft mine was.
Anyway, I think that’s pretty much it for the Christmas recap. I can’t believe I actually got this posted before January. LOL. I’m usually late on these things.
Have a fantastic 2017, everyone!
XOXO,
FLIP + CHING
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